Thursday, March 04, 2004

Reunions in my family are always worth attending simply for the novelty of being around apocalyptic white trash (thank you Sandra Bernhard). Once the family rented a pavilion at a state park in Arkansas for the annual gathering. As it happened, Arkansas didn't shut down the entire park to the public, and many unfortunate souls came by along the path wending between the gigantic springs of the park and the pavilion. I wonder if the woman in the wheelchair thought she would be communing with nature that day, breathing the fresh air and escaping the cruelties of life, if only momentarily? She made her way slowly, laboring to scale the gradual incline of the path. Her legs were both removed above the knee. In a just world, she could have made her way unhindered through the glories of nature, but then again--in a just world, my family and all its tangled strands of DNA would never have existed. It would have been a mercy, too, if the woman could have glided by unmolested by Colton and Austin, my cousin's two young sons. Colton and Austin have the developmental level of a three-year old baboon, with equal communication skills. Austin ran up to the woman shouting "Hay Colton! Come look! This lady ain't got no laigs! Hay lady! What happened to yer laigs, lady?" Uncle Billy (the proud grandfather) said "them kids are gonna end up dead or in prison." Quite.

No comments: